


A Tender Trap

by stitchy



Category: Campaign (Podcast), Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Demisexual Character, Friends to Lovers, Humor, M/M, Romance, Trapped In A Closet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-04
Updated: 2018-07-04
Packaged: 2019-06-05 07:02:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15165212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stitchy/pseuds/stitchy
Summary: How can the crew of the Mynock finally get Leenik and Tryst to sort out their nonsense? The same way they solve everything- by capturing them on purpose!





	A Tender Trap

    “Eee!” Leenik yelps, when he unsuspectingly drifts within Tryst’s range. He nearly drops the tea tray he just took from the kitchen table, but his suction cupped fingers make the save.

    “If you don’t want to get pinched, you have to wear green on Palabar Day!” Tryst insists for the umpteenth time. His smuggler-style vest is green, and so are his socks. The holiday was nearly over, and few of the Mynock crew had embraced the spirit of Palabar adequately, save for Tamlin, who was still marching about, singing a Palabar dirge Tryst had played on the piano earlier.

    Leenik rubs the sore spot on his behind and blushes. “I _am_ green.”

    However perfectly Palabarian a shade of green his friend might be, the customs of the day make no exceptions for reptilian participants over fleshy ones. Everyone knew that. And given how many times Leenik has left himself wide open for it, Tryst feels pretty safe assuming he _wants_ to be pinched. He raises his hand again and waggles his fingers teasingly. “That doesn’t count. And I know you have a green shirt you lent me on Nar Shaddaa.”

    “I can’t wear that shirt without a wig, it drains me!”

    “You could always borrow one of my kimonos,” Tryst offers. There was one the color of the Dorumaa sea with a black lace that he imagines would look very handsome. He applauds himself internally for being so generous, a tenant virtue of the Palabar Day festivities. “Or one of those little braided bracelets we got at Shalova?”

    Leenik rinses his teacup. “Pass,” he says, nonchalant.

    Tryst smirks. No matter how many easy outs he’s given, Leenik never says ‘stop’. Yep. He wants to be pinched.

    “I guess you’ll have to be tolerant of my religious observations and take your chances then, dude,” hey says, getting up. Tryst nips at him a few more times, rapidfire. Leenik gasps and giggles and then retaliates with several soft swats at Tryst. Somewhere in the aft compartment, Bacta grunts.

    “If you’re not too busy touching butts-” he calls to them. “-could you two give me a hand with this crate? I think pulled something in my back.”

    “Ask Lyn,” says Tryst. “Have you _seen_ her lift with those guns??” But it _is_ a day for generosity, so he goes to help anyway, with Leenik close behind still trying to land a tickle counterattack.

    Bacta stands over a crate in one of their escape pods/linen closets with his hands planted in the small of his back and a strained look. He steps out of their way. “Thanks boys.”

    They keep their hands to themselves long enough to get a grip on either end of the container. “Well, here’s your problem.” Tryst nudges the still-magnetized crate, stubbornly stuck to the floor. He looks over his shoulder at Bacta, bracing himself outside of the compartment with one hand and looking surly. “No wonder you-”

    CLANG! The hatch unexpectedly shuts them in, with Bacta on the other side.

    “48 hours!” he shouts amid beeping of the activating controls. “Quit it with the karking excuses and TALK!”

    Apparently in on the trap, another voice shouts. “Zis is for your own good!”

    Tryst sighs. All the holiday pinching and tickling must have pushed Bacta and Lyn’s tolerance for his painfully slow courtship of Leenik over the line. He's of the mind that Leenik will come around in his own time, and really, it only makes him crazier about the guy- but Tryst can admit that it must be annoying from an outside perspective. He really should have seen this coming.

    “Bacta! Lyn! Let me out!” Leenik pounds on the hatch, first with one fist, then two. “What situation has ever been solved by us talking more?” he demands, in a moment of uncommon self-awareness. “You’re always telling me to shuttup!”

    But then it’s too late for Bacta to explain any further, as the pod unlatches from the main hull and Tryst’s stomach sinks. He can’t believe it. Getting put in Time Out or Beach Jail is one thing, but being jettisoned is so un-Bacta! It’s a waste of fuel and a hassle to reverse, at the very least. Tryst flails for one of the interior handles as the metallic creak of the capsule release is quickly followed by the explosive firing of thrusters.

    Leenik shreiks as he topples backward over the crate. “Tryst!”

    Instinctively, Tryst stretches out and catches him in one arm, then pulls him close and pins him against the wall to protect his skinny little bugman body. The Life Day lights strung between the shelves flicker as projectile paint cans and packs of business cards fly off. Compared to regular spaceflight, this launch is like cutting the cable on an elevator. The collar of his shirt tightens as Leenik balls his fist into it with eyes clenched tight. Wedged between a girder and a rack of lawn chairs, Tryst can feel him shaking from head to toe as they fall towards the planet.

\- 48:00 -

    They land in a heap of elbows and boxes on the innermost wall of the pod, dizzy and only narrowly in command of their breadsticks.

    “You okay?”

    Leenik shifts in the rubble to check. “Yeah.”

    Tryst pushes himself off the floor and looks up at the hatch, now orientated overhead. Not ideal. Not particularly romantic, either, but hey! He has 48 hours to get results. Maybe if he riles Leenik up enough, half that. He weighs the options in his head. Should he make it last, or make it fun? Tryst rolls his eyes. As if it were a question! He loves riling Leenik up, and it’s so, so easy! All he has to do is play dumb for the potential benefits of 1) making Leenik huffy and snoot wiggly (cute) 2) make Leenik tell the truth, if only to show him up (tactically advantageous), and 3) possible smacking (just plain hot). And he's even better at playing dumb than he is at playing piano, uh- _thank you very much_.

    “What is Bacta’s problem?” he wonders aloud, rubbing his shoulder. “Did you use his medical adhesive for moustaches again?”

    “No!” Leenik clambers to a stand, aforementioned snoot wiggling in distress. “I don’t know! You didn’t get into the lesai, did you?”

    “You know I need my beauty rest.” Tryst grins and laces his hands together into a foothold. “Will you do the honors?”

    Leenik steps up and uses the boost to disengage the hatch, flooding the escape pod with the orangey purple light of sunset. He pulls himself up and onto the roof then reaches back in to pull Tryst out, too. They sit with their feet dangling into the pod and watch the ballet of a triple moon rise.

    “Not the worst way to close out Palabar Day, huh buddy?” Tryst pats Leenik on the back.

    “Sorry we got marooned on your dumb holiday,” Leenik says miserably. He leans into Tryst's arm around his shoulder, though.

    “We’ve already established, it’s nobody’s fault but Bacta’s. And Lyns! For not using her crazy arms to pick up the crate instead of us!”

    “Do you think Tony’s upset I left without saying goodnight?”

    “Eh, the kids are all right for 48 hours,” Tryst chuckles. “Usually we abandon them for muuuch longer.”

    “I have been asking for a vacation,” Leenik says, considering. He looks up at the night sky, each of the three moons reflected in his giant eyes. “We should make the best of it!”

    Tryst claps his hands together. “Now you’re speaking my language.”

    “I'll check what’s in that crate, hang on.” With that, Leenik slips back into the pod below and tackles with the crate, now tipped on its side.

    When he peeks in, Tryst sees Leenik take a small paper from it’s contents. “What’s that?”

    The ridges over Leenik’s eyes do a dance of surprise and frustration as he reads it. “Nothing, don’t worry about it.”

    “Lemme see.”

    “You can’t even read it! Back off.” Leenik dodges Tryst’s swipes from above and wins the game of Keep Away by simply cramming the note in his mouth. He gulps. “There.”

    “Fine, be that way. What else is in there?” Trysts eyes go wide when Leenik pulls out two bottles of wine, next. “ _That_ you have to share.”

    The rest of the crate is filled by the expected spare linens and an auto-mattress, of course, but also a decent stash of dry foodstuffs and a personal-sized moisture vaporator. Leenik mumbles _something something Bacta something something meddling_ , but lights up when he discovers a jatzbox. “I’ve been looking all over for this!”

    “That things a relic!” says Tryst, noting its make. It didn't even have a holodisplay.

    “It has all my favorite music from the space 90’s!” Leenik flicks a switch to make sure it still works, and sure enough, a familiar Sixcredits None The Richer tune plays. He quickly turns it back off and packs it back into the crate with the rest. “Looks like the camping stuff is mostly in the other escape pod.”

    Tryst scopes out the surrounding terrain and sees only peaceful looking herd animals in the distance, grazing, unconcerned with their presence or any other threat.  “I think if we tip this thing right side up, we’ll be fine setting up shop here.”

    It takes over an hour to push, pull, and rock the floor side of the escape pod back to the ground and clean up inside, but they at least they have tunes. Leenik whistles REO Landspeeder as he rolls out the auto-mattress. “I’ll miss plumbing, but we’ve definitely done worse,” he sighs.

    “Remember Mygeeto?” The ground was so rocky there they couldn’t even dig a latrine.

    “If you care about me at all you will never mention it again!”

    Tryst chuckles. While the bed inflates, Leenik joins Tryst outside where he’s arranged two lawn chairs and has begun tossing packs of business cards into a fire.

    “Told you these would come in handy,” Tryst says, dropping into a chair.

    “It’s gonna get rained out any minute.” His snoot wiggles a bit, testing the air.

    “You can’t know that.”

    “I can, I’m from a swamp world. I know a thing or two about precipitation they didn’t teach on Tatooine,” Leenik harrumphs. He still takes his own pack of cards to ignite by shock glove and toss into the bonfire.

    “Okay, Mister Monsoon.” Tryst teases, but he’s genuinely curious. “How do you know?”

    One of Leenik’s long green fingers points out at the horizon, where smudgey clouds gather over the mountain tops. “That one there’s a cumulonimbus, the one that’s dark on the bottom. Look how tall it is. That’s high winds, so it’s fast. It wasn’t there when we first got in and now it’s bent like it’s coming our way.”

    “And is it in your mighty power to predict how long-”

    Before Tryst has a chance to finish asking, the sky flashes bright up with bolt of lightning. Leenik taps his foot until the accompanying thunder announces itself. “Ten minutes,” he says, then crosses his arms, satisfied.

    “Just long enough to get this bottle started, then. C’mon.”

    Leenik obligingly whips out one of his knives to pry the cork and offers Tryst a sniff. “Any good?”

    “Perfect.”

    Luckily they didn’t have any glasses in the pod, as they would almost certainly have shattered in transit, so instead they pass a bottle of purple Corellian back and forth until it’s finally time to flee into the pod. They strip down to their standard-issue heart print boxers and stretch out on the mattress with their heads at the hatch door, where they can watch the fire dwindle in the rain. It’s cozy, with the Life Day lights over head and music playing, even though the mattress (like everything else they own) is kind of ratty and sags in the middle. They end up falling asleep pressed together in the dip, a little drunk and sweaty, but content.

\- 36:00 -

    In the morning, a blinding ray of light streaming in through the hatch wakes Tryst first. It takes a moment to register that they’re not home on the Mynock, but there’s an arm slung over his belly as Leenik snuffles against his side, which is a pretty good clue. He always sleeps alone at home, but they share a bunk when they’re off-ship all the time. It is rare they get a chance to sleep in like this on those off-ship occasions, however. More often than not there's blasterfire for an alarm clock. He keeps still, so as not to wake his friend before he can enjoy the moment. The not-quite-hotblooded-enough-to-be-human heat against his skin is so pleasant, he almost falls back asleep. He dips in and out of a daydream where Leenik is licking him awake from navel to neck. Then Leenik has two mouths, with the second by his cheek, nibbling on his ear. Incredible.

    “Mmmmmleenik, that’s so nice,” Tryst mumbles. He blinks fully awake and comes eye to eye with one of the grazing herd animals, bristly and brazenly chomping on his hair. “WhhaaAAAH!”

    Always on a hair trigger, Leenik springs out of bed from a dead sleep, repulsor fist leveled at the threat. “I’m up, I’m up!” he says, hopping into a defensive stance. Just as quick, he coos when he locks eyes with the gentle beast. “Ohhh you sweet thing. Tryst look, she’s giving you kisses.”

    “No means No!”

    Fortunately for Tryst’s scalp, the commotion is too much for the creature and it lumbers off to make quieter friends. Leenik folds at the knees and plops back down on the bed next to him to access the damage. “I can feather that out,” he promises. His fingers gently comb the slobbery hair behind Tryst’s ear.

    “Ugh.”

  
\- 31:00 -

    Inspired by their visitor, Leenik breaks out the paints and starts a mural on the side of the escape pod that depicts the beast and Tony as angel-winged. Swirls of bronze, gray and white dolloped with yellow bloom and come to life under his capable hands.

    “I think you made the right call giving it only half as many teeth” Tryst says, admiring the art.

    “Should I do us, too?” Leenik rolls the tip of his paintbrush in his mouth to bring it to a finer point.

    “May I make a suggestion?”

    “If it’s good.”

    “Us... but as hairchompy beasts,” Tryst spreads his hands in showmanship. “One beautiful and blonde, one gorgeous and green.”

    “I. Love. It.” Leenik covers his heart with both hands, splotching paint on his shirt. “Will you do Bacta, Lyn, and Tamlin beasts?”

    Tryst picks up one of Leenik’s brushes. “I’d like to see you try and stop me.”

    A few hours later things are shaping up. Halfway through, Tryst was feeling a little iffy about it but now that he’s started putting tattoos and stripes all over, his masterpiece is back on track. They aren’t exact, but the texture feels right. Leenik is pretty engrossed in his work on the opposite hull, and so he hasn’t seen so much as heard his friend’s progress. Lots of declarations like 'This is why quadrupeds don’t wear kimonos...' and 'More spots!' are being made on Leenik’s side of things.

    “Can I look yet?” Tryst hollers over the blaring Backstreet Borts.

    Leenik’s voice wavers. “Oh. Uhhhhm.”

    Tryst puts down his tools and starts to round the corner of the escape pod, but Leenik apprehends him before he can see anything, pushing him back.

    “No! Don’t look.”

    “Woah, I can wait til you’re ready.”

    “I... don’t want you to look at all!” Leenik stammers. “Please Tryst.” He steers Tryst backward, pleadingly. “Just. Go back on your side. I’ll go back to mine and I’ll just... I’m gonna whitewash it and start over.”

    Tryst stands still, puzzled, as Leenik circles back to his mural. He thinks better of it when he hears the splash-clunk of an entire paint can against a wall. “Leenik?”

    “Just go away!” Leenik growls. “Just go into the pod until I’m done, I don’t want you to look.” His voice sounds so sad and small, a stampede of hairchompers couldn’t keep Tryst from rushing to his side. Screw waiting for Leenik to come to him.

    “Buddy, what’s going on?” he asks, kneeling next to Leenik. He’s sitting on the ground with his head between his knees like he can’t bear to look at what he’s done. Tryst glances over his shoulder to see a splotched but otherwise painstakingly rendered pair of beasts, as he expected. One green and antennaed and one golden, happily pressing their noses together. Obviously Leenik is wrestling with openly expressing what he wants, but it’s a long way from being so graphic an image that he couldn’t talk his way around it, if he wanted to.

    “I got carried away,” Leenik tries to explain. “I’ll cover it. Just leave me alone.”

    “Why are you avoiding me?” Tryst tries to make eye contact, but Leenik covers his face with his hands.

    “Because I want to be with you!” he shouts through his fingers. He jumps to his feet and starts pacing.

    “Those are opposite things!”

     Leenik shakes his head furiously. “Argh! I want to be WITH you, with you. Like living together forever and raising kids together and love and kissing and...! We already do all that!” Leenik angrily shakes his repulsor fist up at the sky. “-So it’s not worth podding us over, Bacta!”

    While it’s true that they already have a lot of the trappings of a couple, it wouldn’t be such a sticky subject if Leenik didn’t have more in mind. Tryst gets up but keeps his distance. Playing dumb has got them this far, so he shakes his fist up at the sky too. “Yeah Bacta, we already have the Mynock and Tamlin-”

    “-and _Tony_!”

    Tryst rattles on, “...and that time at BHIKKE! And the other time at BHIKKE and like five more times...” Tryst has genuinely lost track of how many times he’s let Leenik trick him into a kiss. Just how many excuses and hypotheticals has he floated Leenik’s way to make it easier?

    “Seven...” Leenik corrects him.

    “Yeah!" he says with mock-indignation. "Bacta knows the statute of limitations, this started like, a million clipboards ago!”

    Leenik nods, fast and panicked. “Uh huh, yeah, this is just the way things are and it’s fine. I’m fine with it! You’re fine with it.”

    “Yeah, I’m fine with the kissing,” Tryst agrees. “And more! Bacta wouldn’t airlock us for that, right?”

    “For what?”

    “For _more_ than kissing.”

    “How would I know?” Leenik bursts. “You’re the one seducing every evil maniac we come across. I've never done it! I don’t even want to have sex with anyone but you!”

    Now they’re getting somewhere. Without ever really talking about where things are headed between them, they’ve never had defined boundaries. Tryst will do or not do anything Leenik asks, but he’s not a mind reader. No matter how good a pilot you are, you can’t meet someone in the middle in infinite dimensions- Tryst needs coordinates. He would never touch Leenik or only touch Leenik- whatever it took to make him feel secure. But it's a two way hyperlane, and he has to ask something that's been troubling him, too. “If you give a kriff, then why do you always let me be the honeytrap?”

    Leenik heaves a sigh so deep that Tryst wonders if Rodians have more than two lungs. He finally stops pacing the length of the pod and wraps his arms around himself. “I’m... not good. Very not good. And I'm dangerous. So if you can stand them _...”_ A flicker of hope crosses Leenik’s face as he looks up. It makes Tryst’s heart squeeze.

 _"_ You’re good enough for me, Leenik.” Slowly, Tryst approaches him. “I know you’re a little rough around the edges. A little killery, but...” In this galaxy, what person worth knowing doesn’t have a body count? Tryst reaches out to unwrap Leenik’s crossed arms and get him to lower his shields. He needs Leenik to let just this one thing in, if nothing else. “You’re the best. And you’re my best friend. I always want to be with you, too.”

    “What?” Leenik blinks repeatedly.

    “I know we all have the same bounty on all our heads,” says Tryst. “But as far as I’m concerned, you’re the most wanted man in the galaxy.” He brushes his fingers along Leenik’s adorable, twitching nose in a way that is unmistakably fond.

    Stammering a little, Leenik asks, “You d-don’t hate me for loving you?”

    Tryst grins. “I might hate you a little for taking so long to tell me that Bacta had to maroon us...”

    Leenik’s hand flies up suddenly like he might smack Tryst, but not before Tryst moves in and kisses him- without tricks, without pretense, without being ‘hypnotized’ by anything but his desire to. All the honesty that they held back in their previous, stolen kisses makes this kiss bottomless by comparison, and they sink right into it. Leenik’s fingers weave into his hair and Tryst pulls him in closer and doesn’t let go when their lips break apart. It dawns on him that he’s never just held Leenik before for the sake of being close. The always tense Leenik relaxes in his arms, his antennae drooping languidly.

    “You didn’t see a spare eyepatch in the pod, did you?” Leenik sniffs. He lays his head against Tryst’s chest.

    It warms Tryst with that sunlight-through-the-hatch feeling and he laughs. Getting Leenik all worked up doesn’t hold a holocandle to comforting him. “Hey,” he says softly. “You don’t have to keep your feelings from me. Or Bacta, or Lyn. We all want to be there for you.”

 _Well._  They’ll all be there for him in 28 hours, give or take. There’s still some time to savor in the meanwhile.

**Author's Note:**

> You can follow me on twitter @stitchyarts for more star wars and campaign art!


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